The World Council of Churches on Thursday called on churches around the world to ring their bells 350 times during the Copenhagen climate change summit on December 13 as a call to action on global warming.

Ah, like the tocsins of the French Revolution, summoning the masses to pack up the kids and picnic baskets, and hasten to the town square for a few rounds of exciting head-to-head action with Madame Guillotine.

Quote:

"On that Sunday, midway through the UN summit, the WCC invites churches around the world to use their bells, drums, gongs or whatever their tradition offers to call people to prayer and action in the face of climate change," the council said in a statement.What noise does YOUR tradition offer? Beet of the Week to whosoever can tell me what I’m thinking. ~

Quote:

By sounding their bells or other instruments 350 times, participating churches will symbolise the 350 parts per million that mark the safe upper limit for CO2 (carbon dioxide) in the atmosphere according to many scientists," it added.I can’t think of a clearer message than that to send to the world, can you?

Quote:

"In some countries, the question has been raised whether churches have the right to use their bells for what may be considered to be a political campaign," said Guillermo Kerber, WCC programme executive on climate change.

Well, of course they have the right to use their bells for whatever they want. They’re simply not allowed to accept money from the government to do it.

Imagine hearing all those bells and gongs and drums going off all around you, at the same time! What a noise! What a cacophony! Dogs will howl, and babies will wail. It will be a sound such as no other, heard around the world.

“Ma! Ma! What’s that infernal noise? Is there a tornado coming?”

“Don’t be silly, Pa, we’re supposed to be out of tornado season now. Though what with Al Gore and all that climate change talk and whatnot, tornado season could be all the time now.”

“Air raid? Is it an air raid?”

“Don’t be silly, Pa, this is the United States of America, Barack Obama is the President, and he’s long since apologized to the rest of the world for us being way too big for our collective britches. Who would ever dare to attack us now?”

“Then what IS it, Ma? I’m tryin’ to watch football!”

“Listen, Pa, listen. Count the bells. How many times did they ring?”

“Confound it, Ma, you know I went to public school and can’t count past twenty-six. That’s why I’m so consarned impressed that Obama hacked all of 100 million dollars from the federal budget.”

“Look, Pa, you got your remote control and your (cough) smart box and your satellite dish with 350 channels. If you can count those channels, you can count how many times the bells are a’ringin’. They’re ringin’ 350 times and you’ll never guess for what.”

“350? Well, of course I know what that means, Ma. I told you, I went to public school. That’s how many millions of acres of Amazon rainforest are being destroyed every minute to make way for Wal-Marts and fast food restaurants.”

“Close, Pa, but not quite. Don’t forget, I went to public school, too. No, 350 is the number of polar bears who drowned when global warming caused the ice to melt beneath them during the time it took to ring them bells 350 times.”

(Junior skips into the room.)

“Ma, Pa, you’re both wrong again. Everyone knows those 350 chimes are for the 350 parts per million marking the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.” (cough) “According to scientists. Well, maybe not all of them, but a lot of them.”

(Everyone choruses.) “The time to raise awareness about climate change is NOW!”

Sha-zam!Comrades, this is it! This is the answer—or should I say, this is the ultimate wake up call that all of the world is sure to answer! They have to!

This is guaranteed to get everyone’s attention now! We’ll raise that awareness yet!

Then we can finally sit down and start talking about which exotic resorts we’d like to book for the series of annual conferences we’ll have to have on what we hope to accomplish with our newfound, total global awareness of climate change.

There aren't any churches around here that have church bells so what we're going to do here is put church bell ring tones on our cell phones and go around all over town in stores and restaurants and places where lots of people are with our cell phones ringing all day.

Golly, what a good idea! But after they ring 350 times, shouldn't they pause and then ring one million times so that everyone knows what the denominator of the sacred fraction is? Just a suggestion.

Count me in! I'm going to stand in my driveway and set my car alarm off 350 times to raise awareness of climate change. I'm sure this might raise the awareness of the police and irascible neighbors, but I'm sure they will stop pummelling me when I point to the "Honk if you hate Climate Change" bumper sticker on my SUV.

Commissarka Pinkie, it is my highest dream to someday win a Beet of the Week award. Perhaps you were thinking of using... human flatulence sounds as a call to arms summons on comrade Goracle's global warming?

Congratulations! You are the newest recipient of Pinkie's prestigious Beet of the Week Award!

And for your mother's car:

Additionally, you get to use the "Reserved for Beet of the Week" parking space in front of Party headquarters (vehicle must be green-approved hybrid with no oil leaks and no more than 2 wheels and/or single axle). Plus you get a free gift card to Pup's Pleasure Party Palace (non-transferable, restrictions and blackout dates apply).

Now, go out and celebrate . . . and find out just how easy it is to get a date now!

Commissarka Pinkie, I considered the clanging together of tin-foil hats, or the jousting of shovels, or keying cars that have bumper stickers that say, "Climate Change is a Myth."But in the end, I decided to walk door to door in my neighborhood, ring the doorbell, and then bash the person on the head with a set of crash cymbals. That way they would never forget. And you still get that ringing effect.

I Denounce Turboski for redistributing my idea of praising Obama and by extension other progressive ideas with flatulence. *Somebody* is looking to get their time allotment cut short. Right around the time they score a date with their meaningless and without value Beet of The Week(TM) award.

Comrade Colonel, I am indeed shamed for momentarily rejoicing in this Beet of the Week award (and yummy pie), and not in fact redistributing the award to you. I have seen some of your recent work as the powerful Commissar of Time ™ when you unleashed one of your time traveling agent birds to attack CERN (see below).

By EBEN HARRELL Eben Harrell – Wed Nov 11, 10:15 am ETSometime on Nov. 3, the supercooled magnets in sector 81 of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), outside Geneva, began to dangerously overheat. Scientists rushed to diagnose the problem, since the particle accelerator has to maintain a temperature colder than deep space in order to work. The culprit? "A bit of baguette," says Mike Lamont of the control center of CERN...While most scientists would write off the event as a freak accident, two esteemed physicists have formulated a theory that suggests an alternative explanation: perhaps a time-traveling bird was sent from the future to sabotage the experiment. Bech Nielsen of the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen and Masao Ninomiya of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics in Kyoto, Japan, have published several papers over the past year arguing that the CERN experiment may be the latest in a series of physics research projects whose purposes are so unacceptable to the universe that they are doomed to fail, subverted by the future....

Yes, Centrally Planned Time(TM) is a powerful tool Comrade. I just can't seem to use it to get a $@!^#$(!*&!!! Beet of The Week(TM). Something about Pinkie's gold plated shovel seems to block my attempts to manipulate time in her general area.

This is a Gold Mine!We need to work on this one.I've already told my conservative neighbors to go outside and start pointing and screaming at the sky at 3:10PM 12/13/2009; "The meteor is coming! Take shelter! The Mayans were off by three years!"

Does the original story mention if the ringing could be performed cowbells? In that case, the more the merrier. Because the planet has a fever, and the only prescription is, well, you know. 350 cowbell hits please!

Also, I don't know if this will be off topic, but this thread inspired me to start another worthy campaign: "Save the Unicorns! They're fer real, asshole!"

6666 units please for my 6666 Woomba Loomba's who just surpassed their carbon output by 1,000,0000,0000/333 parts due to tromping rides on their Unicorns in the "Save The Unicorns - They're Fer Real O-HOLE" Campaign.

Passing the word of Awareness on Global Warming Climate Change, comrades, to all roosters.

For those of you who have many questions regarding the use of something other than church bells, please note the following excerpt from original article:

Quote:

The leading council of Christian and Orthodox churches also invited places of worship for other faiths to join a symbolic "chain of chimes and prayers" stretching around the world from the international date line in the South Pacific.

"On that Sunday, midway through the UN summit, the WCC invites churches around the world to use their bells, drums, gongs or whatever their tradition offers to call people to prayer and action in the face of climate change," the council said in a statement.

Because promoting and maintaining diversity is just as important as raising awareness, by all means you should absolutely make whatever noise represents your own tradition or belief-system.

So yes. Margaret's doing 350 cell phone ring tones. Opiate will set off 350 car alarms. Turboski plans to eat a lot of beans and then--well, I would just steer clear of Turboski that day. Casserole Czar is going to clang 350 people with cymbals, Red Square is doing cowbells, and Colonel 7.62 will fire off 350 rounds.

Oh, and Colonel--as long as you care about the Important Issues and you're firing those rounds to raise awareness about climate change, then it's always considered Progressive. And if someone ends up getting shot as often happens when this sort of thing is done in the inner cities of LA or Chicago on New Year's Eve--well, broken eggs and omelets. It's for a good cause! (Which is not to say that Red's idea of shooting 350 deniers is not without merit, but we have to consider the possibility of backlash and retaliatory violence from right wingers).

And Rooster's doing 330 cock-a-doodle dandies? Why 330 and not 350? What does 330 represent? Is THAT the millions of acres of Amazon rainforest being destroyed in the time it takes to read this post? Remember, in raising awareness, regardless of the issue, the number must symbolize something to do with that issue or people won't know why we're doing it, and then their awareness won't be raised without which they won't pledge money to the cause, and a million more polar bears will die between now and that conference in Copenhagen.

Think, Rooster, THINK! Have you any idea how much time they spent huddled around a conference table, ordering out for pizza and surfing the net on their laptops as they tried to come up with a viable number they could link to the Climate Change crisis and use to raise awareness of that crisis? Surely you don't think they pulled that "350 parts per million that mark the safe upper limit from CO2 in the atmosphere" from out of their collective as--as--well, anyway, as for me, I will whack 350 proles with my shovel.

I NEVER said 330! I SAID#%)!.... er 350! That's right, because I know 330 would be the WRONG number, and I would NEVER mistakenly do something WRONG and admit it!!! (like pull a speculative number out my a...butt to support my theories ... er scienctific facts... er, I mean, I WOULD NEVER MAKE THE MISTAKE OF PUTTING A NUMBER (in a budget, spending bill, tax form, or otherwise) THAT DID NOT CORRESPOND WITH THE CURRENT TRUTH!!! IT'S ONLY A MISTAKE WHEN I DO IT ON PURPOSE!!!(and get caught)

(Psssttt... can I get that funding for a new "conference room" for The Wombat Factory™ back now?)

Comrade Red Square, the delay in the conference is all planned. After the Berlin Wall screw up, we have been tweaking our computers here. Relax, everything is in order, and we are just juggling realities and universes around. The problem is not everyone recognizes Central Time(TM) yet damnit. But we are working on it! Soon nobody will realize anything BUT the Current Truth(TM) of Central Time(TM). (Also Pinkie made it very plain that she did not wish to go through a certain feminine time of the month for quite some time. Offset one thing, well another thing moves around. Equal and opposite reactions and all that. But the good news is that our Dear, Sweet and Loving Pinkie will not be experiencing discomfort for quite some time now...)

On, on they send, on without endTheir frightful tone to every home.Snark! how the bells, loud climate bellsAll seem to say, we're doomed today.Climate Change is here, bringing us fearTo young and old, (we'll take your gold)Ding, dong, ding, dong, that is their song,With mournful ring, (all ding-a-lings)One seems to hear words of without cheerFrom everywhere, (dead polar bears)Freedom we'll pound, into the groundO’er hill and dale, deniers we'll jail

For this you are hereby named the latest recipient of Pinkie's prestigious Beet of the Week Award!And for your mother:

Plus you get to oust Turboski from the "Reserved for Beet of the Week" parking space in front of Party headquarters, and you receive a free gift certificate to Pup's Party Pleasure Palace. Time to go howl at the moon!

And as for you, Colonel 7.62: Referring to matters gynecological as they pertain to me will not win you Beet of the Week, but it will get you a well-deserved whack with my shovel.

Allow me to redistribute that discomfort you mentioned:

WHACK!

How's that for getting your clock cleaned, Timeboy?

Having been shovel-whacked, you are now about to have some "difficult days" Colonel. During this time period, at the first sign of blood you should go see Red Rooster. His Woomba-Loombas are sure to have something to help you with your new and special--ahem--problem.

And don't forget the importance of exercise! Extra hours digging ditches with a shovel will keep the cramps away. (Vodka and dark chocolate is nothing but an old babushkas' tale, so I will take those away from you and redistribute them to myself, since I suspect you think of me as a crabby old babushka--especially right now.)

And don't worry, Colonel--male comrades can't tell what's going on with you as long as you keep smiling and don't whine.

Laika - Ukraine has absolutely no problem staying within the 350 CO2 limit, given that a lot of factories are still closed and Russia keeps limiting the supply of natural gas and threatening to cut it off completely. In part it's because some Ukrainian plutocrats, mostly former Party apparatchiks, had been leeching on the Ukrainian portion of the pipeline, stealing and reselling Russian gas on its way to Western Europe. Left without fuel, some Ukrainian cities last year used to turn off hot water in the buildings for the summer - go bathe in the river!

It had nothing to do with Global Warming, but that shouldn't stop the Party from celebrating the people's selfless sacrifice for the sake of global climate non-change.

My dear Pinkie, my experiments have proven to be a success. You whacked a version of me from another reality. With a little effort and monitoring of the temporal systems, I can remain unwhackable in this reality...

Oh crap. Of course me in another reality will have the same idea and sit back gleefully while I get whacked in his timeline.... This. Is. Going. To. Hurt.

Don't forget! 3 pm today in whatever time zone you're in! Have your cowbells and shovels and cell phones and car alarms et al ready to make noise 350 times to raise awareness of Climate Change!

Turboski, I hope you've been stuffing yourself full of beans all this time, and that you're ready to rip:

Comrades, this may be the most important thing we've done yet--the most important thing we'll ever do--to call everyone's attention to the need to take some kind of action on Global Warming now! As the Goracle himself pointed out earlier this week, the polar ice caps are melting before our very eyes! Why do you think you're all freezing your buns off and having to dig your gas-guzzlers out of the snow? That is PROOF that the polar ice caps are indeed melting under the intense heat of Global Warming caused by too much CO2 in the atmosphere, along with the heat, greater than that of the sun, emanating from Earth's core, and you'd better believe we're all responsible for that, too. All that oil drilling caused enough friction to heat up the core above solar levels (science so basic even I could figure out that one all by myself), and that's why you're standing in ten feet of snow that will soon melt and cause floods of Biblical Hollywood CGI proportions.

If you hear any bells or drums or other noisemakers going off 350 times in your community starting 3 pm today, please report them here--we want to know just how much people really care about the planet!

Now, let us all sing Laika's "Climate of the Carol Bells"--and recite the Goracle's Poem. I don't know about the rest of you, but just listening to the sound of his voice reading those words puts tears in my eyes every time:

Quote:

One thin September soonA floating continent disappearsIn midnight sunVapors rise asFever settles on an acid seaNeptune’s bones dissolveSnow glides from the mountainIce fathers floods for a seasonA hard rain comes quicklyThen dirt is parchedKindling is placed in the forestFor the lightning’s celebrationUnknown creaturesTake their leave, unmournedHorsemen ready their stirrupsPassion seeks heroes and friendsThe bell of the cityOn the hill is rungThe shepherd criesThe hour of choosing has arrivedHere are your tools

Lift up your protest signs and raise awareness throughout the Earth. Let the people know they are all tools in his eyes.

The Holy Pilgrim Gore recites, not a poem but an apocalyptic religious text from another planet. A glimpse of it appeared earlier in Star Trek Voyager Season 3, Episode 47, titled False Profits (full transcript).

The Sages in the sky did dwellUpon white clouds that held them well,Until the sentry rang the bellThe Holy Sages never fell.

But when the ringing called them hereFrom the sky they did appear-And there amid the eastern lightsThree new stars appeared that night.

And the purpose of the bell ringing is now revealed - it's a signal to send the Sages back into space from whence they came. Unfortunately, to fulfill the prophecy, the prophets had to be set on fire. But will there be a starship waiting in orbit to beam them out of Copenhagen?

And with the ringing of the bellThe Sages knew where they must dwell.The Holy Pilgrim led them backHigh into the sky of black.And riding on the wings of fireThe holy men rose higher and higher.

I am ashamed. At the appointed time, I was toiling away. I probably made 350 sales pitches today, which is not only an exercise of capitalism, but also a needless exhaling of CO2. My plans to fire 350 rounds from my SKS did not come to fruition...

The Holy Pilgrim Gore recites, not a poem but an apocalyptic religious text from another planet. A glimpse of it appeared earlier in Star Trek Voyager Season 3, Episode 47, titled False Profits (full transcript).

The Sages in the sky did dwellUpon white clouds that held them well,Until the sentry rang the bellThe Holy Sages never fell.

But when the ringing called them hereFrom the sky they did appear-And there amid the eastern lightsThree new stars appeared that night.

And the purpose of the bell ringing is now revealed - it's a signal to send the Sages back into space from whence they came. Unfortunately, to fulfill the prophecy, the prophets had to be set on fire. But will there be a starship waiting in orbit to beam them out of Copenhagen?

And with the ringing of the bellThe Sages knew where they must dwell.The Holy Pilgrim led them backHigh into the sky of black.And riding on the wings of fireThe holy men rose higher and higher.

Oh, the ear changers in the temple. Star Trek Voyager or as I call it, "The Seven of Nine Show."

You know those online personality quizzes people sometimes post to their blogs, e.g. "Which Disney Princess Are You?" (Supposedly I'm Belle from Beauty and the Beast) or "Which Simpsons Character Are You?" (And I kid you not, I always come out as Barney Gumble). Well, they need one called "Which Star Trek Series Are You?"

Dick Cheney is clearly the first one, but I say Obama is Voyager. I'll bet every time he had a meeting about Afghanistan in the Situation Room, you wouldn't have been able to tell it apart from any episode of Voyager.

The uncontested absurdities of today are the accepted slogans of tomorrow. They come to be accepted by degrees, by precedent, by implication, by erosion, by default, by dint of constant pressure on one side and constant retreat on the other - until the day when they are suddenly declared to be the country's official ideology. ~ Ayn Rand

Study: Many non-voters still undecided on how they're not going to vote

The Evolution of Dissent: on November 8th the nation is to decide whether dissent will stop being racist and become sexist - or it will once again be patriotic as it was for 8 years under George W. Bush

Venezuela solves starvation problem by making it mandatory to buy food

China launches cube-shaped space object with a message to aliens: "The inhabitants of Earth will steal your intellectual property, copy it, manufacture it in sweatshops with slave labor, and sell it back to you at ridiculously low prices"

Progressive scientists: Truth is a variable deduced by subtracting 'what is' from 'what ought to be'

Experts agree: Hillary Clinton best candidate to lessen percentage of Americans in top 1%

America's attempts at peace talks with the White House continue to be met with lies, stalling tactics, and bad faith

Starbucks new policy to talk race with customers prompts new hashtag #DontHoldUpTheLine

Hillary: DELETE is the new RESET

Charlie Hebdo receives Islamophobe 2015 award; the cartoonists could not be reached for comment due to their inexplicable, illogical deaths

Russia sends 'reset' button back to Hillary: 'You need it now more than we do'

Barack Obama finds out from CNN that Hillary Clinton spent four years being his Secretary of State

President Obama honors Leonard Nimoy by taking selfie in front of Starship Enterprise